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If rugby league was a person you’d describe him (and it would be a ‘him’) as equal parts star jock, mug lair and masochist.
According to scientists at NASA (who wouldn’t, one assume, have any reason make this up) there’s never been this much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere in the recorded history of the planet.
It’s hard to comprehend the level of naivety (at best) that led Kurtley Beale, Corey Norman, Dylan Napa and all the other sweating young fellows to take video of themselves doing dumb stuff for the amusement of their pals on encrypted WhatsApp chat, but there you go.
They came from Port Lincoln, they came from Oodnadatta, they came from Alice Springs. They emerged from the red dust of Innamincka, a town no more than a pub and a fuel pump, population 12. And they did it each year, and it became tradition.
And so to the one-dayers of India’s excellent cricket tour and it’s a bit like being presented with your granma’s cheesecake after a particularly magnificent long lunch featuring aged, marbled, rib-eye steak, and a ‘64 Shiraz, and beans from Iran, say, or Cuba.
And so to the grand old dame that is the Sydney Cricket Ground, and whatever the state of any Test series – and it’s never usually a decider – then it’s … well, you just have to go.
The wicket at the MCG? The Accepted Group Think after two days of toil appears to be that it’s a steaming pile of hard-baked horse hair.
Luke Kuechly is a linebacker for the Carolina Panthers. A nuggety man and strong, they reckon he’s a shoe-in for the NFL Hall of Fame. And on Monday night against New Orleans Saints we saw why: Kuechly can tackle anything.
And so to the second Test match on the WACA’s sexy new ground named after the phone mob who couldn’t work the Internet to telecast the FIFA World Cup, and it should be really good.
And so to the fabulous 15th week of the regular season in this man’s National Football League, and clutch hit-outs abound.
Well – didn’t the Aussies take the mighty pork sword of justice to those Indian blighters in Adelaide yesterday, wot? Yes they did, and most immutably.
Every sports fan has a bucket list of some kind. We’ve all got a fixture that needs attending at some point in our lives.
And so our Michael Clarke’s fired off at the hip at something that’s upset him.
Well, Jarryd Hayne, eh? Tell you what, you’re writing about Jarryd Hayne this week you best make liberal use of the word “allegedly” because Jarryd Hayne has allegedly ripped off some fairly, shall we say, unusual alleged sex action.
In the English summer of 1999 I was working in London, in Hammersmith, in a funny big cylinder-shaped building called The Ark. A smoker then, I’d nip down every so often and light up a gasper, and have a yarn with whoever was about.
Rugby Australia chief Raelene Castle has been making calls. Ringing around. Trying to find someone to be sole selector of the Wallabies.
And so! The long hot summer of cricket is here and it’s cricket season again, again, and people are running about in long white pants in the sun and it’s good to be alive! Can you sing Hallelujah like Nick Cave did at Glastonbury in ‘98?
And so another one bites the dust as the chairman of the Cricket Australia board, David Peever, feels the chilling finger of fate upon his neck and reads the writing scrawled in goat’s blood on the wall, and falls upon his sword lest someone thrust the bejewelled dagger of Conan into his back.
It’s a cloudy and woolly-wet morning on Sydney Harbour as the men’s and women’s eights from Sydney University and Melbourne University prepare to contest The Australian Boat Race, a facsimile of The Boat Race that Oxford and Cambridge contest each year on the River Thames.
NASA has no such graph. They could probably rig you up one based on the odds of you picking the card at the Valley, my tip about 8 million to one. That’s why bookies drive Mercedes.
Question: If they cancelled the Cox Plate one year because it was 47 degrees and horses might die, and the AJC and Chris Waller and, I dunno, Johnny Tapp said climate change was rooting racing, would that … affect you?
Hot enough (to cancel the Test match cricket) for ya?
Ha. You even look at it?
Here: https://climate.nasa.gov/evidence/
Evidence. Facts and stuff.
Hot enough (to cancel the Test match cricket) for ya?
I don’t know mate. I know it’s NASA. They have put up a graph. And they are Experts. I trust Experts from NASA over James from Forbes, and Investors.com, and Alan Jones, and every other screaching parrot beholden to big coal, and what have you.
I trust the Scientists. They have no reason to lie about it. They have not conspired all together to lie about it. Since humans began pumping shit into the sky, the planet’s getting hotter you only need measure glaciers to prove it. And it’s unprecdented in the last 650,000 years.
And NASA.
Hot enough (to cancel the Test match cricket) for ya?
Graph. Titled “How we know” https://climate.nasa.gov/evidence/
Hot enough (to cancel the Test match cricket) for ya?
NASA scientists say it’s a Thing, and humans are causing it.
Hot enough (to cancel the Test match cricket) for ya?
Yeah I was surprised Renshaw didn’t get extended run.
If this were a timeless Test, Cheteshwar Pujara could bat until July
I remember that line … and how the pics illustrated the best way to walk off with dignity… had a picture of someone doing it, Greg Chappell I think: bat under the arm, take gloves off, get off. It was such a bible.
Roll on summer of cricket, roll on
Ha. Nice one. Worse things for sheets to smell like than cricket bat.
Roll on summer of cricket, roll on
That, Maxwell, is a horrible tale.
Ha. Fair to say it tested the premise that pain is not just an emotion.
Roll on summer of cricket, roll on
Nah mate, it was actually relatively light. Not a Hurricane. It was just a “twin-scoop”, I think, with Hookesy’s signature embedded in it. Cracking bit of willow.
Roll on summer of cricket, roll on
Ha. By interesting I believe you mean completely wrong, Paul, but thanks. And yeah Sutto’s a good fella. They love him down Maroubra. Reckon junior coach would be good role for him.
John Sutton: Peak Bunny
Ha. Blind hope! The best kind.
Go the V. Here is hopin.
But I’m afraid, my man, the Hot Broncs are gonna towel you up in Vegas.
First sits two points ahead of eighth. You pick a winner
Ha. Broncos premiership wouldn’t be a nightmare for me. Nor would Storm, not really. My team’s out the back door on Mad Monday the Daily Tele couldn’t even be bothered sending peeping toms to.
First sits two points ahead of eighth. You pick a winner
I’ll be here, Rook. And I’ll stand by “Saints are rubbish” until they aren’t. Hope they come good. Can’t see it.
Can you? Is there cause of optimism among the Red V people?
First sits two points ahead of eighth. You pick a winner
Yeah, you could make a case for the Dragons, but not a good one, for mine. Be laughed out of court. But then stranger things have happened. The Cows made the grand final last year without Thurston. Donald Trump’s president. People watch old mate the Beaver whatever his name is, Honey Badger, on a reality dating show. Kooky times.
First sits two points ahead of eighth. You pick a winner
True. Yet Griffin didn’t want it broken, presumably. Gus has exercised the option to break it, punt him and pay him out. And then the Tigers coach as a replacement, that the Tigers believe lacks integrity, presumably at least until they gain satisfaction, which could only come in the form of cash from Panthers world of pokies, and/or a better coach than Ivan. As Marina said: it’s business. I think bandying about Loyalty and Integrity in matters of business… they’re not words generally connected with business.
Breaking Bad: League contracts are signed in invisible ink
Don’t quite take your point, Paul. Journos can’t write Fiction, they’d be out of a job. You can write Opinion though, and it’s never wrong.
FWIW I’m a freelance, sole trader. Like a sub-contractor though I sign no contract and have no employer as such, just a series of Publishers I knock out stuff for. Bit like footy players, indeed we share a union (with Actors), though they sign contracts that don’t appear worth much if both parties agree they want out of em. Which was my point.
I’m not quite across yours.
Breaking Bad: League contracts are signed in invisible ink
Thanks. I think.
Origin's great shift: How New South Wales ended Queensland's dynasty to start an empire of their own
Agreed. But you did read this bit “Yet this is not to say we’re looking at a decade of Blue Time. This is not to suggest we’re at the start of a Cleary dynasty”.
And this bit, which I quite liked because I could include Jake the Mus in Star Wars:
“he Maroons can win series in the next few years on the back of their generation next. Fact. Queensland is like a veritable breeding ground for league people. Seen that bit in one of the dud Star Wars prequels, where there’s all the stormtroopers cloned from Jake the Muss? That’s every town in Queensland from Cooktown to Coolangatta.”
Origin's great shift: How New South Wales ended Queensland's dynasty to start an empire of their own
Thanks Graham. My bad. Looks like the Sub-editors fixed that.
Cody Walker … is going gangbusters for the Bunnies on the left with Johnny Sutton, and R.Jennings is leading try-scorer because of it. And … I think he needs another season of shit-hot footy, as Keary’s had, before he’s in the conversation. Could be just me. Maybe a premiership and a hot start to 2019, and Freddy comes a-callin… I think not ATM, just cos incumbents.
Origin's great shift: How New South Wales ended Queensland's dynasty to start an empire of their own
Y’know I reckon the interchange down to six is going to mean there’s less like Shannon and more like Angus Crichton who’s name I didn’t bother to spell check, and now feel bad. There’ll still be a place for the Giant Orc … but three of them you’d think would be a luxury late in the game that the little zippy ones could exploit.
The Bunnies' pigs have made them top dogs
Sport can do stuff, like everyone. But the big picture is all the cars and smokestacks pumping rubbish into the air. It’s got to stop. We’ve got to get energy from the sun and wind, and the waves and stuff that doesn’t so root the atmosphere and environment, the thing otherwise known as where we live.
Hot enough (to cancel the Test match cricket) for ya?